Chillenium Pits College-Level Game Developers Against One Another

Students from 12 universities will gather on the Texas A&M University's College Station, TX, campus the weekend of Sept. 23 for the Chillenium, in which teams of college students compete to build the best gaming software.

When the teams from campuses as disparate as Ohio State University, West Virginia University and Baylor University gather at 5 p.m., Friday, Sept. 23, they will learn, for the first time, the theme of the competition. At that point, they will have until 5 p.m., Sunday, Sept. 25, to develop games with hardware they bring with them to the contest and software either available online or on their own computers.

Gaming industry professionals from companies such as Unity, Houdini and Boss Fight Entertainment will be on hand to offer advice to the student teams.

On Sunday evening, a group of gaming experts, sponsors and fans will play and rank the games in terms of innovation, quality and completeness. Awards, including licenses for professional-grade gaming software, will go to the winning teams of up to four students each.

More than 200 visualization, computer science and engineering majors are expected to compete for the prizes in what is considered the largest student-run game jam in North America.

"This year's event has attracted more competitors and sponsors than ever before," said Texas A&M Visualization Experience Lab Founder and Professor Andre Thomas.

This is the third annual Chillenium competition at Texas A&M, whose master of fine arts in visualization program was listed this year by the Princeton Review among the top 25 graduate game design programs in the United States.

About the Author

Michael Hart is a Los Angeles-based freelance writer and the former executive editor of THE Journal.

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